New data reveals jobs with highest death rate from coronavirus

[MeanwhileTime]

news.sky.com/story/covid-19-new-data-reveals-jobs-with-highest-rates-of-death-from-coronavirus-12198285

I wonder if they adjusted the teacher/school staff figures to cover only September to December, as schools were closed from 20 March until 4 Sept.

People working in close proximity to each other, and in jobs with regular exposure to the virus, continue to have higher death rates when compared with the rest of the working age population.

Is it wildly inappropriate to say no shite Sherlock at this line in the article? Did anyone think this would not be the case

Not surprised. I work in one of those industries and we have had multiple positive cases this year. Thankfully no one was seriously ill.

On teaching and education:

There were 139 deaths involving the coronavirus (COVID-19) in teaching and educational professionals aged 20 to 64 years registered between 9 March and 28 December 2020 in England and Wales. For both sexes, rates of death involving COVID-19 for this group were statistically significantly lower than the rate of death involving COVID-19 among those of the same age and sex, with 18.4 deaths per 100,000 males (66 deaths) and 9.8 deaths per 100,000 females (73 deaths), compared with 31.4 and 16.8 deaths per 100,000 in the population among males and females respectively.

We also compared the teaching occupations with all other professional occupations, allowing us to see how the deaths compare with professions with similar broad economic and educational backgrounds. We found that rates of death involving COVID-19 in the aforementioned occupations were not statistically significantly different to the rates seen in professional occupations (17.6 deaths per 100,000 males; 12.8 deaths per 100,000 females) as a whole, true for both sexes.

@jcyclops

On teaching and education:

There were 139 deaths involving the coronavirus (COVID-19) in teaching and educational professionals aged 20 to 64 years registered between 9 March and 28 December 2020 in England and Wales. For both sexes, rates of death involving COVID-19 for this group were statistically significantly lower than the rate of death involving COVID-19 among those of the same age and sex, with 18.4 deaths per 100,000 males (66 deaths) and 9.8 deaths per 100,000 females (73 deaths), compared with 31.4 and 16.8 deaths per 100,000 in the population among males and females respectively.

We also compared the teaching occupations with all other professional occupations, allowing us to see how the deaths compare with professions with similar broad economic and educational backgrounds. We found that rates of death involving COVID-19 in the aforementioned occupations were not statistically significantly different to the rates seen in professional occupations (17.6 deaths per 100,000 males; 12.8 deaths per 100,000 females) as a whole, true for both sexes.

So does that mean they didn't just look at Sept - Dec, as they clearly should have? Crikey, a child could rip that methodology apart. Embarrassing.

Did it not occur to you to maybe express just a little bit of sympathy or concern for the fact that so many of the lowest paid and least respected in society have been left at the greatest risk - which I think is sobering and shameful - before banging on about yourself as a teacher? You could have pretended to be less self-absorbed?

That's sad. I can't quite see how chefs are at risk so much.

So does that mean they didn't just look at Sept - Dec, as they clearly should have?

Well no because schools were still fully open for three weeks of March, so you need to include March, April and possibly some of May. You can't just exclude half the year because it doesn't say what you want it to

And even May, June and July schools were open, albeit it to very small numbers.

@PinkyParrot

That's sad. I can't quite see how chefs are at risk so much.

Me neither, especially as a lot of places have been closed so much.

@Hardbackwriter agreed. The fact all MN seems to be focused on is statistics about teachers really shows the middle class bias of this site.

These statistics show that those in low income jobs are most likely to die and even more so if make. What needs to be asked is why?

Anyway, this is risk of death, not of contracting the disease, which explains clearly why it skews towards low paid, high contact jobs and towards men. Teachers may be at higher risk of contracting the illness (though I know data's fuzzy still) but they may not be at a higher risk of dying due to a whole host of demographic and health reasons.

@PinkyParrot

That's sad. I can't quite see how chefs are at risk so much.

Close together, lots of shouting over noise, but the figures are high especially given pubs and restaurants were closed for significant periods.

I wonder as well if there are factors such as housing at play (houses of multiple occupation perhaps)

Schools were only completely shut for the summer holidays.

And those six weeks or so coincided with the times that deaths were at their lowest. So I think the difference is probably marginal at best.

@Hardbackwriter

Did it not occur to you to maybe express just a little bit of sympathy or concern for the fact that so many of the lowest paid and least respected in society have been left at the greatest risk - which I think is sobering and shameful - before banging on about yourself as a teacher? You could have pretended to be less self-absorbed?

Agree completely

the numbers for education-occupation deaths are very low in absolute terms.

That's why no subgrouping for different time periods -- The confidence intervals for mortality rate (demographically adjusted for the occupational groups) would be too wide to be meaningful.

Screenshots are Total male deaths (with occupation described), total females (single column, but same occupation order).

The June occupational update seems to say 5000 deaths by May; Jan'21 update had 8000 deaths so far. You would have to be claiming that every single one of the education occupation deaths occurred in Sept-Dec period to get an excess (maybe).

There's no There there.

What they haven’t done is adjust for deprivation levels, so it is not clear how much risk our lowest paid workers are at because of their job, and how much because of the fact that they are low paid. Similarly are certain workers more likely to be BAME?

It’s a very blunt analysis so hopefully they have other data to draw on when making decisions about e.g. priority for vaccines. Will we only vaccinate a particularly hard-hit demographic if they work in a factory, for example?

A lot of restaurants have remained open for take out throughout places and it looks very crowded the kitchens.

@GoldGreen it's made me so angry. I'm married to a teacher, it's not that I don't care about or have respect for teachers, but the MN obsession that they're the only ones at risk is so insensitive to their actual, relatively privileged position.

Jesus as always MN turns it into a teachers thread. 😫

Let’s just ignore the report and focus on why it does not support schools being shut because that is the only agenda on MN!

Also, if they are comparing with other professionals (e.g. lawyers, accountants) the vast majority of those were working from home for a big part of last year, more so than teachers.

Teachers were still in work between March and July, not all were WFH so they would have been in contact with each other even if not all or even many pupils. The data still stands, I believe, without just selecting from September when schools fully reopened.

ps: totally agree that stats on harm caused by non-fatal illness or simply the stress of covid-mitigation-teaching are different harms also worth measuring; although sickness from covid infection will correlate highly with age-adjusted mortality, anyway.

The article seems to have women as an after thought.

@iVampire

Schools were only completely shut for the summer holidays.

And those six weeks or so coincided with the times that deaths were at their lowest. So I think the difference is probably marginal at best.

Well, not quite. Teachers have always said that distanced classrooms would be much safer. That’s what we had from lockdown until the summer holidays. @Hardbackwriter I’ve never seen any teacher say they are the only ones at risk. You destroy your own argument with this nonsense.

@Hardbackwriter

Did it not occur to you to maybe express just a little bit of sympathy or concern for the fact that so many of the lowest paid and least respected in society have been left at the greatest risk - which I think is sobering and shameful - before banging on about yourself as a teacher? You could have pretended to be less self-absorbed?

Yes quite. It's embarrassing to be a teacher (I am) these days. Things in schools haven't been perfect but really?